Akrasia

Chapter 29

  
    The flight back to the tower seemed like forever, especially for Bucky and Peter. It was easier for Peter because he had Happy to talk to, or anyone considering how much he talked. Although, Bucky didn't, or at least he didn't want to. Steve attempted to start a conversation with Bucky, but his head was else where. It was with Lainey.
   Constant worry flooded his thoughts. He didn't want to hear about what HYDRA did to her. His punishments were horrible, and the idea of her experiencing them made Bucky want to kill everyone in sight. She was too young and happy to go through unnecessary shit in his mind. Whether she disagreed or not. Bucky simply wanted her safe and cared for. That's all he tried to do, even though Lainey obviously didn't want it.
    Relief coursed through Bucky when the flight was over. He ran up to the living room already expecting Tony to be there. He tried to get Tony to update him, but Tony didn't. Either because he wanted to wait for the others, or because he wanted to annoy Bucky. Both seemed ideal, the second one even more.
    When the rest of the Avengers rush into the living room after their painfully long flight, they find Tony sitting on the couch waiting expectantly for them. Along with Bucky impatiently waiting as he leaned on the couch armrest. Tony started to talk as everyone sat down and got situated. Including Happy, who stood in the back of the room.
   "She's alive, if that makes you guys feel better," Tony started. That first sentence released an unbelievable amount of tension in the air.
   "How is she though," Bucky presses not letting Tony even get a chance to speak again.
   "That depends on what you think good is," Tony commented earning an inpatient huff out of Bucky. Everyone was slightly irritated with Tony taking forever, but they were used to it and dealt with it.
   "She is stable, which is good. Lost a lot of blood from the gunshot, which was predictable.  The doctors were able to get the bullet out, also good-" Tony was cut off by Steve who was getting frustrated.
   "Tony, please just straight up tell us. No more of your unnecessary commentary. Please," Steve said relaxing again.
   "Okay, capsicle. Well, her left hip had slight fractures in it. I'm assuming that was from the car crash. Her right wrist was also broken. She also has a concussion. The main problems were the gunshot and hip. Although, there were an unbelievable amount of cuts, lacerations if you will, along her limbs. An occasional down her face. Then there were bruises and road rashes. They cleaned all of the wounds to prevent infection," Tony was about to end when he remember some other stuff.
    "She's very dehydrated too. So they have her hooked up to an IV to provide her with nutrients until she wakes up," Tony added.
   "She's not up yet," Peter asked with concern sitting up a little straighter.
    "No, and I wouldn't expect her to be for a while. She went through a lot and her body needs rest. The doctors estimate it might be another two days until she's going to wake up," explained Tony. The faces around the room sort of crumpled. It was obvious they were all expecting her to be awake, even though they knew it was unlikely that that would be the case. Tony noticed Peters posture decrease at that news, which encouraged him to tell Peter to go home.
"Look kid, you should go home now," Tony said earning a "I don't want to" face from Peter.
"Okay," Peter answered standing up. He didn't want to, but he knew there was no way he wouldn't not go home.
"Happy will take you back," Tony nodded at Happy who moved to the elevator.
"You did good today, Peter," Steve commented genuinely before Peter was inside the elevator. Everyone felt bad for the kid. All he wanted to do was help, yet it felt like he was never able to. The Avengers all saw it too. Once he was gone Steve spoke up again.
"How is she, truthfully," he asked earning curious looks from everyone else.
"Physically, she will recover," Tony said taking a breath before carrying on, "but we aren't sure about her mental health. What the doctors and I examined, it seemed a lot of her injuries came from, torture, if you will. The amount of cuts on her body makes it seem like that was the only thing that occurred," Tony stopped talking to observe his teammates.
"Constant torture," Clint whispered lowly underneath his breath. Natasha had a straight face, but inside she felt horrible. She understood what constant torture felt like. Same with Bucky, but he knew what it felt like coming from HYDRA.
"Do they know when she'll actually wake up," Bruce questioned quietly.
Tony answered, "No, they thought it could be whenever. I just didn't want to say all the details-"
"In front of Peter," Steve finished for him.
"I'll stay down with her the whole time," Bucky offered. No one challenged it sense they all knew he would whether they would have it or not.
"Okay," Steve confirmed, nodding at his friend.
"We will need to question her at some point," Natasha reminded them, regretfully. "Within a few days," she also added on. Everyone nodded their head showing they remembered, including Bucky, who didn't want to remember.
As everyone else started to go into deeper details, Bucky stood up to leave. No one cared, so they didn't stop him. Slowly, Bucky made his way down to where she was staying. A deep breath flooded his lungs right before he twisted the nob of the door.
Bucky felt the need to cry at the sight of her frail body laying in that white bed. Even though she appeared to be helpless, he knew she was a firecracker when she was awake. That's all he wanted at the moment. Was her. Happy. That's it.
A chair was pulled over next to her bed for Bucky to sit on. He was prepared and more than ready to be with her till she was ready for him to leave. He hoped she never was.
As he made his way closer, Bucky could see the cuts littering her limbs. With his experience, he understood that these were all done by the same knife, constantly. Assumingely, whenever something didn't go someone's way, which made them take it out on her.
His calloused fingers trailed along each scratch. Regret and pain filled his eyes at the sight of her condition. Bandages covered her left leg and hip, the wounds would soon turn into a million scars, her pale skin set out her large, colorful bruises, and dark circles took refuge beneath her tired eyes.
He couldn't help but feel sympathy, pain, anger, heartache, confusion, and simply just emotion. Bucky hated when something made him weak, yet he didn't hate Lainey. Lainey was the light of his life. She was pure joy, when she wanted to be, and that's all he needed. In some ways, she was like a daughter to him. As much as he didn't like the idea, he was content with it.
For two days Bucky sat next to Lainey. Waiting patiently for her to wake up. Each day someone different came down to talk with him for an hour or so. Bucky was sitting down doing nothing for practically two days. Sometimes he'd get up to use the bathroom or get food, but mainly it was sit and wait.
On the second night he stayed up late. It was nearly 1 am when he was about to fall asleep. Quickly, he turned the lights off and sat back down. His eyes were drooping and his head was lulling forwards and backwards. Right as his eyes closed Lainey's eyes pealed open.
Lainey blinked a few times to gain clearer vision. Her eyes were very dry and unfocused. All she could see was darkness. She looked down and once again, everything was dark. Memories of the dark room flooded her brain and along with the the horrors that occurred within that room.
Her breathing quickened vastly. Panic erupted inside of her. The only thoughts coursing through her were that she failed. She had failed to escape, and now they'd hurt her even more for it. Every minute became harder for her to not say anything when she was with them. She didn't know how much longer she'd be able to do it. Most likely they have better techniques to get their information. That was why they were moving her in the first place. If she had only escaped, if she had only succeeded, she would've won. It had been too much, too long, and now she'd kill her family because she was weak. She failed.
The truth of it all shook her harder. Heavy, frightful sobs leaked through her lips. Not knowing what to do, Lainey attempted to back up far away from whatever might be in front of her. The sound of her sobs and shaky breaths woke Bucky up. He immediately turned to Lainey to find her hysterically trying to get away from something in front of her. Looking for the danger, he found nothing, and he knew she was confused and scared.
"Lainey," he whispered soothingly over and over again. His hands reached for her, but right as they made contact she flinched away sending her backwards off the bed. Bucky stood up and instantly ran to the opposite side. At this point, Lainey had curled herself up into the far corner.
"Get away, please, just stop. Get away," she murmured multiple times through her sobs.
"It's okay, Lainey. Please, relax. It's me, Bucky. Just relax. Deep breaths, deep breaths," he said, slowly walking over to her with careful steps.
"Bucky," Lainey questioned out of breath. She had slightly recognized the voice, and hearing the voice confirm who it was made the pressure release her lungs.
"Yeah, it's me. Calm down, calm down," Bucky answered trying his best to help her. He was able to kneel down next to her, but right as he did she slammed into him. At first, Bucky thought she still assumed he was an agent, but then he realized she was holding onto him.
Right at that moment Lainey realized she was safe. Bucky was holding her, and she was safe. She had escaped HYDRA, and she was safe. The truth hit her hard, but she only held onto Bucky tighter. Lainey was overjoyed that Bucky was with her, but the pain from those days spent with HYDRA still drowned her. She was just glad that Bucky was there to help her.
Bucky sat down and scooped her up into his arms, carefully making sure he didn't hurt any of her injuries. Her grip didn't loosen, it only tightened, and her knuckles were even turning white. It was like she was hanging on to him for dear life, and was never letting go.
Her sobs still shuddered and her breaths still quickened. Bucky stroked his fingers through her hair and along her back, trying to calm her down. Small, soothing words also escaped his lips. Although, he found himself having to speak louder because Lainey was murmuring words he couldn't understand into his chest. Words of what they did and how she never told them anything she knew. Words of how much she missed them all and loved them. Words of what she was sorry for and happy for. Just words. Lainey didn't care if Bucky understood her or not because it felt good to be in his arms and let everything go.
Slowly, her sobs decreased and her breaths became more steady, but her tears still streamed down her cheeks. Bucky knew it wasn't a time to talk, so he just sat there and held her. Lainey cried and cried. Whether they were tears of fear, sadness, joy, Bucky didn't know. All he knew was that she needed him to be her solid rock amongst her storm.
An hour had passed and Bucky was still cradling Lainey, and Lainey was still griping Bucky. By then, her breathing had relaxed and her tears were minimal. She was just letting him hold her. Eventually, she grew tired from her sobs and panic, and she found herself trying to stay awake. That was the one thing she failed to do. She might've succeeded in escaping HYDRA, but she didn't succeed in staying awake.
Bucky noticed her even breaths, and knew she fell asleep. A warm smile cracked his lips. Gently, he turned around to lean against the wall. Still holding her, he let his eyes close and fell asleep.
   At 9:37 am Bucky woke up. For a while he studied Lainey before waking her up. When he did, she tensed up, but once she remembered where she was, she relaxed.
   "Are you okay," Bucky asked letting Lainey move out of his arms.
   "Yeah," Lainey replied, not totally sure how she was. Bucky's face was not amused because he knew better than to believe that.
   "Either way, the teams probably going to come down here soon. They'll want you to explain some stuff because we haven't been totally sure on much information lately," Bucky explained standing up.
    "Okay," Lainey said moving to stand up also. Although, right as she tried she instantly fell back down.  "Ow," she huffed earning sympathetic she's from Bucky. Of course, he did move to help her though. He lifted her up bridal style and then set her down on the bed.
   "Did you forget about injuries or something," Bucky laughed, then immediately stopping after getting an annoyed face from Lainey.
   "Yes, actually. I'm sure you know that I'm not fawn of being injured, so I didn't care to remember," Lainey's voice wavered slightly. Hearing how upset she was, even though he expected it, still hurt him.
   "You'll recover, and-" Bucky was going to carry on, but Lainey cut him off, and he was glad because he had no idea how to comfort her other than hugging her again.
   "Just tell me my injuries briefly," Lainey asked with a sad, yet expected tone.
   Bucky sat down next to her before starting. "You have a concussion, a gun wound, a shattered hip, I think they said that, also a broken wrist, and then road rashes, cuts, bruises, and little injuries," Bucky stated quietly. Lainey looked down at her hands. Bucky could tell she was expecting that news, but still didn't want to hear it. His fingers went beneath her chin, and he lifted her head up so her eyes were staring at his.
   "It'll be okay," Bucky breathed before letting go. As he pulled away he told her one more time, "I love you, Lainey."
   Lainey returned her gaze towards Bucky and took a deep breath. "I love you too, Bucky," she whispered, and what she said was true. She knew it. Bucky knew it too. He pulled her into one last hug and then let go. Right as he did a knock sounded on the door.

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   Last night, the Avengers were awakened by Friday's voice. The AI notified them of Lainey's consciousness. Although, none of them got out of bed. They assumed Bucky and Lainey would need some time. Especially Lainey. They didn't come to see her until 10:00 am, that was what they all planned. When it was time , they made their way towards the room she was staying in.
   "Come in," Bucky called out after they knocked. They all walked in to find Bucky and Lainey sitting next to each other on the white, twin bed. She glanced at them with a small smile. Everyone gave her a sympathetic smile back.
   Each one of them said something little, along with Lainey. When around thirty minutes passed, they began to ask questions. Eventually, Lainey had enough and told them she'd explain it from the beginning, so she did.
   She started from the crash, and ended with this morning. Mixed emotions were shot into the air throughout her explanation. At some points Lainey felt like dying in a whole, or crying, but she never let it happened. She did her best to keep her head high and her face calm.
   Once her explanation was over, the rest of them explained some things. Like how they found her and got her back here. Lainey, of course, was proud to hear that most of it was because of Peter. She wished she could have seen him do it.
    After, they all talked a bit more about things to come, like recovery. Lainey didn't like to, especially considering it sounded like it would take a while to recover, and she didn't have the patience for that. When they were done Lainey claimed that she was starving, and everyone gave her a warm smile and hug. They were glad she still had her appetite. Everyone spent two days just with Lainey. Talking, eating, joking, loving each other, and basically doing whatever. Slowly, Lainey began to fall in her old groove.
   On the third day, she was sitting on the ottoman in the living room when the elevator opened. She didn't bother to look over her shoulder to see who it was. That was until she heard the persons voice.
   "Lainey," Peter exclaimed quietly, but still with joy. Her head whipped around upon hearing Peter's voice. Just seeing him standing in front of the elevator with a smile on his face put a large smile on her face. Peter ran up to Lainey and gently hugged her. Although, instead of gently hugging peter back, Lainey tugged him in. When they let go, both were overjoyed.
   "How are you," Peter asked eventually.
    "I've been better I guess," Lainey replied. Then she remembered something. "Oh, and I'm sorry I lost you're sweatshirt." Peter looked at her as if she was crazy.
   "I don't care, I'm just glad that you're alive," he answered legitimately, still smiling.
   "Okay, Good," Lainey breathed with relief. "I'm glad that you didn't let Tony push you away from helping," she added making Peter blush a little.
   "It's fine really. I didn't do much," Peter said trying his best not to seem stupid in anyway. For some reason, Peter didn't want to talk about saving Lainey, so he switched the subject.
   "How long is the recovery," he asked glancing at her bandages on her left leg.
   "A while it seems," Lainey responded not with any excitement at all.
   "Good," Peter exclaimed making Lainey look at his as if he was insane. "That means we can do stuff. Like binge watch Star Wars again," he commented with a huge grin, which only made Lainey giggle.
   "Sounds good to me," Lainey said still smiling.
   "Also, if you wanted, we could maybe try to, to go, like to a pizza place at some point," Peter offered and then added quickly, "when you recover more, of course."
   Lainey was baffled as to what he meant. "Like, a date, or something," she asked not trying to be rude.
   "Well, if you want to think about it that way, sure," Peter answered hopefully.
   "Okay, I will," Lainey replied smiling. Peter let out a breath he was holding for a while and replaced it with a smile too. All of the Avengers, who were watching the security footage together that whole time, were also smiling.

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Ahhhhhhh!!!! Guys, I'm done!!!! Hopefully you all liked the ending. Also, thanks for reading this book fully. I really appreciate it! Have a great rest of you're year guys!!!!!!! Yayyyyy!!!